Palestinian succumbs to wounds sustained during 'Great March of Return'

June 21, 2018 3:21 P.M. (Updated: June 25, 2018 2:33 P.M.)

GAZA CITY (Ma'an) -- A 23-year-old Palestinian, Muhammad Ghassan Abu Farhana, succumbed on Wednesday night to wounds he sustained during the "Great March of Return" on May 14th in the besieged Gaza Strip.

Abu Farhana's body was transferred from the hospital to his family in the besieged Gaza Strip on Thursday afternoon.

Locals told Ma'an at the time of Abu Farhana's injury that his wounds were critical; he was immediately transferred for medical treatment to Saint Joseph’s hospital in occupied East Jerusalem.

Abu Farhana was reported to have succumbed to his wounds on Wednesday night.

Large crowds awaited the arrival of Abu Farhana’s body at the Erez crossing (Beit Hanoun) in the northern Gaza Strip to prepare for the funeral.

Abu Farhana’s family members told Ma’an, that they decided to hold the funeral right after the body's arrival on Thursday afternoon at the Omar Bin Abed al-Aziz mosque in al-Farahhin area in eastern Khan Younis City in the southern Gaza Strip.

According to the Gaza Ministry of Health, More than 135 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli forces during the "Great March of Return" protests in the Gaza Strip since March 30th. Additionally, around 13,000 Palestinians were injured by Israeli forces during the marches.

The "Great March of Return" protests were launched by thousands of Palestinian civilians in Gaza -- which has suffered from a decade-long Israeli siege -- who took to the borders to demand their right of return as refugees to their orignial homelands, now in present-day Israel.

Rights groups condemned Israel’s excessive use of force against protesters, who were participating in “The Great March of Return” a weeks-long planned protest during which Gazans have demanded their right to return to their original homelands inside present day Israel.

Adalah, the Legal Center for Arab Minority Rights, released a statement condemning Israel’s use of military snipers against the civilian protesters.

“The Israeli military’s use of 100 snipers against unarmed Palestinian civilian protesters in the Gaza Strip is illegal, the statement said, adding “live gunfire on unarmed civilians constitutes a brutal violation of the international legal obligation to distinguish between civilians and combatants,” the group said.